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June 9, 2025 - Uncensored - Piers Morgan
55:31
20250609_you-wont-silence-me-gaza-war-greta-thunberg-stunt-
Transcriber: nvidia/parakeet-tdt-0.6b-v2, sat-12l-sm, and large-v3-turbo
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Time Text
Greta's Flotilla Controversy 00:08:08
All the pictures I saw this today when I woke up were of Greta Thunberg grinning her head off being given a sandwich by the IDF.
She's taking it upon herself to get on a boat and ship food there.
That is what people do in a protest.
Filming a video before they were even intercepted claiming they were kidnapped is absolutely reprehensible.
I mean it's just shameful.
You're vile.
You're a liar and you're vile.
Well there are two distracting sideshows overshadowing the current horrors unfolding in Gaza.
The first is Greta Thunberg's selfie yacht, which has inevitably been intercepted by Israeli forces en route to the Gaza Strip.
My name is Greta Tunbe and I am from Sweden.
If you see this video, we have been intercepted and kidnapped in international waters by the Israeli occupational forces or forces that support Israel.
I urge all my friends, family and comrades to put pressure on the Swedish government to release me and the others as soon as possible.
No, Greta, you've not been kidnapped and your choice of words is frankly an insult to the many Israelis who were kidnapped and held hostage by Hamas.
56 of them shamefully remain in Gaza, many of those presumed dead.
And no, you're not raising awareness about the humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
Many of us have been talking about it daily because we see the horrific scenes of desperation and starvation unfolding before our eyes.
The only thing you, Greta, are raising awareness about, as always, is yourself.
And on that note, the second big distraction at the moment is this.
Answer me that one question.
Do you know how many Hamas terrorists you've killed and how many children you've killed?
Do you know those two numbers?
I know the numbers that came from the IDF.
I know the numbers that came from a very, very astounding.
Give me the two numbers.
Wait a second.
How come you know exactly how many Hamas terrorists you've killed, but you have no idea how many children you've killed?
Cares about children.
I just asked you a simple question.
And at the same time, Hamas is deliberately using the children as humans.
I'll give you the answer.
Because in the end of the day, we never target civilians.
We only target the terrorists.
Why don't you know the statistics?
And we, look, you can ask this question.
Are you saying no children have been killed in Gaza?
I didn't say that.
Are you saying that?
I didn't say that.
I said...
Well, I make zero apologies for taking a tough line with the Israeli ambassador, who is the Israeli government's former representative in the UK.
I asked her 17 times how she could be so certain about how many Hamas terrorists Israel has eliminated, but apparently doesn't have a clue how many innocent children have died in the process.
17 times.
She just failed to give me an answer.
Well, the National Jewish Assembly released a statement which condemns the interview in the strongest possible terms, but it's so far not condemned the deaths of so many civilians and children by an Israeli government, which two former Israeli prime ministers have now accused of senseless killing and war crimes.
Laughably, their statement says when pro-Hamas apologists appear on his show, they are met with nods and softball questions.
Anyone who's watched this show at all in the past 18 months will know how ridiculous a claim that is.
What's currently happening is a sustained campaign of abuse and intimidation by people who don't like that I'm calling out what I now see as a war of pointless destruction.
And exactly the same thing, of course, on the other side, when I repeatedly defended Israel's right to respond to the heinous attacks on October the 7th.
Back then, they said I was in the pocket of mysterious Israeli paymasters.
Now I'm apparently funded by Qatar because I went to a state dinner in Doha to meet the President of the United States.
Well, sorry to disappoint you, but nobody pays me to have any opinions about anything, least of all a war.
My opinions change as facts change, as everybody should.
And no one's going to abuse and hector me into saying anything other than what I actually believe.
In a couple of minutes, I'll talk about all this with my panel.
Well, first, I'm joined by the UN Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, Francesca Albanese.
Welcome back to Uncensored Francesca.
Thank you, Pierce.
I just wanted to ask you, first of all, your reaction to what's been going on with Greta Thunberg.
I've got to say, I have not been impressed by this.
I think this was a very distracting piece of narcissistic attention seeking by somebody with a track record for doing this, who then compared herself by using the words like kidnapped to the people who've actually been kidnapped in this war, which I thought was extremely distasteful.
I know you've been talking to her or some of the crews, certainly.
What did we gain by this?
So, first of all, thank you for having me, Pierce.
I hope we will have a peaceful conversation because I've been up almost all night following what was happening to the flotilla and responding to journalists interested in knowing what was happening.
I would like to reframe the old discussion, if you allow me.
So, because the flotilla mission was a lawful humanitarian effort, not a stunt.
And because of this, we need to look at why they were there and not who was there.
As you know, Gaza has been starving.
As you know, it's incredible, it's abominable that a country whose leaders are indicted or investigated by the ICC for atrocity crimes and who's been investigated as a state for genocide get to control the flows of aid.
This is absolutely ludicrous.
Aid should be given according to principles of humanity, neutrality, impartiality, and independence.
Instead, Israel has turned this into a sadistic abattoir, as Chris Gannis recently put it.
So, the flotilla has substituted the inept reaction of the international community, which has expressed words of condemnation at best.
So, what I think is that the flotilla with all the people who were on board is all but performative.
And let me tell you why I think that people like Greta Thunberg or Rima Hassan came on board.
Yesterday, I was not in touch with her.
I've been in touch with the captain because, together with other special rapporteur Piers, we have sought the support, called for the support of the flotilla since the very beginning, because we think that the flotilla is doing, even if symbolically, what member states should be doing.
But just a few weeks ago, another flotilla with anonymous activists was hit in international waters.
It was probably a crime, and no one has uttered a word.
And in 2010, 10 people, 10 activists, were killed, and no one has been held accountable despite a UN investigation.
So, people like Greta Thunberg and others came on board using their visibility, putting everything in the line.
What have they achieved?
Honestly, listen, listen, but what have they achieved, honestly, other than Greta Thunberg getting her face on a lot of newspapers, right?
With a big, well, hang on, with a big beaming grin, receiving food, receiving food.
Let me finish.
All I've seen are big pictures of her grinning her head off, receiving food at the end of her ordeal, which lasted a few hours.
She knew exactly what was going to happen.
She knew the IDF would not let her anywhere near Gaza.
The whole thing is, I think you said, is performative.
And I'm not seeing people running around going, good on Greta Thunberg.
Really changed my mind about what's happening there.
They've all gone, hang on a sec, you're calling yourself a kidnapped victim and your kidnappers are giving you food and then taking you to a safe place afterwards.
Aid Distribution Concerns 00:11:52
Why would you use that kind of analogy when actually the war is raging as you know, because Israel is determined to kill all the Hamas terrorists and get their hostages back who actually were kidnapped?
I think you are the only one left who still believes the killing all Hamas terrorists, Piers, frankly.
Israel has such a sense of the people.
I said that's what Israel is saying is trying to do Hamas terrorists.
I've actually been.
No, hang on, hang on.
I've been very critical.
Just to be clear.
Just to be clear, Francesca, I've been very critical of the Israeli government.
No, but you're still mentioning that Israel is killing terrorists.
I'm repeating their mission statement, which they said was to eradicate Hamas and get their terrorists and get their hostages back.
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I didn't say that this is performative at all, rather, the contrary.
And the fact that you and I are speaking of this boat is while you have not been interviewing me about the other flotilla who was hit in the middle of international waters and it was deflagged, which is an incredible violations of people's safe sailing and security when it happened a couple of weeks ago.
It's people like, I mean, sorry, I'm not saying people like you, but the media is quite sensationalist and it has been salivating around the fact that there was Greta Thunberg on the boat.
I've never talked to Greta in the context of this mission.
I've been talking to the captain and to the communication room on the ground because I was just interested.
You know, Pierce, people in Gaza are seriously starving as they are bombed every day without respite.
400 people are killed every day.
And I've seen a glimpse of hope on the face of many because they were waiting for the flotilla.
There should be more flotilla.
Come on.
You don't believe that for a moment.
And then I'm sorry, Francesca.
It's simply ridiculous to think that anyone in Gaza would thought that this flotilla was actually going to get anywhere near them and give them any of the relatively meagre supplies they had.
The only person who ended up being fed was Greta Thunberg by the IDF.
How is that anything but a painful embarrassment?
Do you really believe Israeli propaganda, throwing sandwiches at them?
Of course, the answer was give it to the people in Gaza.
Come on, Pierce.
Come on.
You're better than this, Pierce.
That's for propaganda.
You're better than this, the idea you think that anyone in Gaza?
Hang on, hang on, hang on, hang on the middle, hang on Francesca.
This is what was scared of Francesca.
You do not believe for a moment, if you're honest, that anybody in Gaza genuinely thought Greta Thunberg was going to rock up on the beach with supplies.
You knew that was never going to happen.
You, nobody in Gaza said to you, did they?
We think that's going to happen.
Nobody did.
You clearly seem not to read my mind, Pierce, thankfully.
No, it's that you're wrong because you keep on focusing on Greta Thunberg while people like me and people I've been speaking with in Gaza didn't even pay attention.
For them, what matters is that humanity has not forgotten them, is that there is someone who tries to break that awful siege that has turned their ghetto into an extermination camp, Piers.
Again, I say let's move away from the flotilla because the flotilla, one thing is sure, has raised two important points.
First, is that member states are not doing enough.
And if there is something that is performative, is Western condemnation, including that of the UK, because this boat was sailing with a UK flag.
And the fact that Israel says in international water, intercepted in international water, a UK flag sailing boat means that this is an act of, can qualify as an act of aggression against the UK.
Have you heard the voice of any UK politician on that?
Maybe they spoke.
I didn't hear that.
And again, this is the usual politics dynamic.
The rest is that today there is a lot of attention, a lot of focus on this.
And in 30 minutes, one hour, there were millions of people who had seen my alarm and that of others on the...
I was on the phone with them as they were encircled by vessels and then by quadcopters.
Quadcopters are the drones who are there to shoot Pierce.
And I asked these people, guys, put on the helmets, can you?
And they say that.
Nobody shot them.
Nobody shot them.
No one did anything.
Yeah, but in 2010, they did.
Can you predict what Israel will be doing?
I was sure that Israel will not give orders to shoot at these people because of their visibility.
But it takes one person to be in the wrong state of mind for things to go incredibly wrong.
10 people lost their life in 2010, Piers.
And we would dishonor their memory if we continue to ignore them and talk about it.
2010 is a very different story at a very different time.
For you, for you, Piers, but not for the people in Gaza.
Hello, because you woke up in 2023.
No, no, I was covering it in 2010.
2010.
Just to be clear, I was covering it.
They had already suffered from the city.
I was covering it then.
I want to CNN.
I was covering it all then.
I've covered this conflict for decades.
So don't call it.
Don't be patronizing about when I've covered this and what I've said.
If you go back and check, you'll know.
But the reality is that despite your heroic attempt to build this as some great fantastic protest that grabbed the world's attention, actually most people thought it was a puerile, pathetic stunt by an attention seeker.
Where are the statistics, Piers?
I really would like to see the statistics because I don't think so at all.
Pierce, this is so disingenuous because it really look at what's going on around the world.
There is support expressed toward the flotilla all over the world.
The flotilla is a joke.
The flotilla was a joke, a publicity.
An attention-seeking publicity stunt that was designed to raise attention for Greta Thunberg.
Nobody else, no one in Gaza's benefited from this ridiculous stunt.
It got nowhere near Gaza.
It was ever going to get anywhere near Gaza.
Obviously, she knew that.
We knew that.
And if she's that concerned, why is she grinning like a Cheshire cat in all the pictures?
What's so funny?
You should not be insulting the facial expression on anyone.
She's insulting my intelligence with her facial expression.
Well, don't grin.
Is that serious?
Don't grin.
I feel desperately concerned for the plight of the innocent.
Even I feel desperate.
Let me finish.
Come on.
Let me finish.
I feel very concerned, as I've been saying loudly in the last week, about the ongoing, appalling plight of innocent civilians in Gaza.
All I can say for sure is that this stunt has done absolutely zero to help any of the people in Gaza.
Zero.
This is your opinion, Pierce.
I respect it very much and it counts zero.
Okay.
Well, in that case, we will agree to disagree.
Thank you very much indeed for joining me.
I appreciate it.
You want to talk to me about Gaza and the awful situation there and the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.
So you just wanted to talk about what you think it's a stunt.
You called me for that.
So I'm an international law expert and you called me on your program to talk about Greta Thunberg.
Well, you've had nearly 20 minutes to talk about whatever you wanted to talk about.
I answered your question, Pierce.
You had 20 minutes.
If you want us to talk about something else, talk about something else.
However, I won't bother you further.
Thank you very much.
Till the next one.
Bye-bye, Pierce.
Bye-bye.
Well, joining me now, the American Israeli commentator, Emily Schrader, Anna Kasperin, executive producer and host of The Young Turks.
Preguy Us, Shabos Kestenbaum, who's suing Harvard University over anti-Semitism, and Omar Bada, the Palestinian-American journalist.
Well, welcome to all of you.
Let me start with you, if I may, Emily Schrader.
The interview I just conducted there with Francesca Albanese from the UN, I just find it extraordinary that anyone would think that Greta Thunberg with her silly flotilla stunt was doing anything other than promoting Greta Thunberg.
But have I got this wrong?
I mean, that was a pretty painful interview to listen to.
I actually happen to agree with you very much when it comes to Greta.
It was very clear that this selfie yacht was a production for Greta, by Greta and for Greta.
It did very, very little, if anything, to even raise awareness for the situation.
And of course, how they framed it, filming a video before they were even intercepted, claiming they were kidnapped, is absolutely reprehensible.
I mean, it's just shameful to even use this language at a time when there are dozens of hostages who are still in Hamas captivity 612 days today, utterly shameful.
And beyond that, the humanitarian aid that they were allegedly taking into the Gaza Strip, which was 100 kilograms of flour, just one truck of humanitarian aid that's being transferred by Israel into Gaza right now contains 25 tons of flour alone.
That's 250 times what Greta was bringing in on the entire flotilla.
And that's only one truck.
So if we say that Israel brings in 100 trucks of humanitarian aid that is then distributed by the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation that they're working with now, assuming that Hamas isn't shooting them, then that means that 200, excuse me, 25,000 tons of aid, 25,000, 25,000 more tons of aid are being distributed to Palestinians in the Gaza Strip by the state of Israel with the production,
with the assistance of local Palestinians on the ground than what Greta was bringing in in the first place.
So the idea that this had anything to do with helping Palestinians on the ground is absurd.
And I actually agree with you completely that there was nobody in the Gaza Strip that believed Greta was going to roll up on the shores of Gaza and provide humanitarian aid.
Strategic War Decisions 00:12:39
No, I'm going to come to Omar to respond to that.
But just before we move on, I also want to talk about the two interviews I've done, one with the Israeli Ambassador of the UK and one with Natasha Hausdorff, the lawyer, in which both of them, I just kept asking the same question, Emily.
I'm going to ask it to you.
Why is it that everyone on the pro-Israeli side of this can always tell me exactly how many Hamas terrorists have been killed?
But they can never tell me how many innocent children have been killed in the process of killing the terrorists.
Why are they only counting the terrorists being killed, not the children?
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Well, first of all, I'm not an Israeli government spokesperson.
I never have been.
I've never worked for the Israeli government.
But I don't think that we know exactly how many Hamas terrorists have been killed.
I think that they have an estimate.
And I also think that they have an estimate of civilians.
They have not been releasing those numbers consistently throughout this war because it varies a lot.
And in addition to that, we have a lot of the lists that have been released by Hamas, at least initially by the Gaza Ministry of Health, which is, of course, Hamas controlled, that they have changed the data after the fact.
So there's a lot of inconsistencies.
There's a lot of information from the dust that has not settled.
This is an ongoing war.
And I think that's part of the reason we don't know all the answers to that.
Nonetheless, any civilian death is a tragedy.
It's an awful, awful thing.
I wish that it wasn't happening.
But unfortunately, it is Hamas that has rejected repeated ceasefires, including the most recent one that would have seen at least two months of ceasefire, as well as the release of 10 hostages, as well as the bodies of dozens more.
All right, Omar, first of all.
A pause in fighting.
A pause in fighting is not a ceasefire.
A pause in fighting is not a ceasefire.
I'm so sick of the rebranding of a ceasefire.
A two-month pause in war is not a ceasefire.
Period.
End of story.
Go ahead, Omar.
Then Hamas is welcome.
Hamas is welcome to release all of the hostages.
I said what I said.
All of the hostages.
This is not a ceasefire.
This idea that you release the hostages on Israel and continue their genocide is unacceptable.
Unacceptable.
But anyway, continue.
You know what else is unacceptable?
The fact that there are more than 50 hostages being killed by more than a violent individual.
Let me ask you something.
Let me ask you something, Emily.
You were on this show.
You were on this very show a year ago debating Abby Martin.
And you said, you fancy yourself a journalist.
During that debate, you said that Israel has no interest in occupying Gaza.
Israel is now very obviously and overtly claiming they intend to occupy Gaza indefinitely.
And they announced the construction of 22 illegal settlements in the West Bank, which they also intend to annex.
Can you now admit to the world that you are incorrect?
No, the situation on the ground changes.
And beyond that, this could have been admitted in the files.
If the hostage is finally released, and if Hamas had surrendered their weapons, which is something that Israel has stated, rip your wire and do you know what the ad hominem propaganda is for the Israeli government and you disgust me.
I'm actually not going to hurl.
Israel and Strategic Affairs, you've never worked with them?
Last time I checked, neither of you are identifying as Omar Bada.
So let me come to Omar.
Omar, first of all, I'll talk to you about a few things here, but first of all, your response to the Greta Thunberg Freedom Fotilla, I thought the whole thing was a fatuous waste of everyone's time.
Something that was designed deliberately as a publicity stunt, achieved absolutely nothing, and actually made a bit of a mockery of the real plight of people there.
I think we disagree on that, but let me just say, Emily claims that she is not a spokesperson for the Israeli government.
But if you just listen to the avalanche of propaganda she just spewed on television, the question is: would it sound any different if she were officially hired by the Israeli government?
And the answer is no.
She has no qualms, no intellectual honesty, no moral consistency, and is simply just here to say whatever she needs to say in order to make the Israeli government look good.
So that is pro-Israeli government propaganda, whether you're officially employed by them or not, is entirely secondary.
Now, the question of condemn the Israeli government is that there is something attention-seeking about protests by definition, because you're trying to draw attention to an injustice.
And in the case of Greta, she is drawing attention to the fact that Gaza is under siege, that Israel is blocking food from going in, that people are starving inside of Gaza because of the policy that Israel has imposed on them, and world governments are displaying an unspeakable moral failure in refusing to stand up to the Israeli government and insist that food get to the people of Gaza.
And so she's taking it upon herself to get on a boat and ship food there.
That is what people do in a protest.
Yes, she may have known that it's unlikely that the Israeli government and the military are going to allow her to get through, but that doesn't mean that you don't try and challenge unjust systems.
That is just basics.
I mean, when you think about Rosa Parks refusing to get up and go to the back of the bus, you can say, well, that's symbolic.
Well, yes, it is symbolic, but it means something.
You can't seriously.
Sorry, Rebecca.
You can't seriously.
You refuse to accept it.
Omar.
Omar, with the best will in the world, you cannot seriously, with a straight face, compare Rosa Parks to Greta Thunberg.
Come on.
I'm not comparing them, but at the point I'm drawing attention to peers.
You literally just saying what's similar about those situations.
No, the point of an analogy is to draw on a similarity.
The similarity between the situations is not that Greta is like Rosa Parks.
What's similar about them is that people in the face of injustice refuse to comply with that injustice.
When somebody sees that a CAFTA population is being refused food, we don't just accept that we are not going to go there.
Just because you individually do not have the power to force the issue yourself doesn't mean that you try to lead by example so that hopefully other people can force the issue and collectively acted the way Greta did.
I just wouldn't actually break that blockade and help the people.
You know, all the pictures I saw this today when I woke up were of Greta Thunberg grinning her head off being given a sandwich by the IDF.
How that helps anybody on the Gaza Strip is completely beyond me.
Let me bring in Shabbos.
Welcome to Uncensored.
I think it's the first time we've had you on.
Look, I've had a lot of heat in the last week from the two quite feisty interviews I did, although the idea that me and feisty interviews are somehow a new brand development seems a bit ridiculous.
But anyway, I have.
And what's been very interesting has been the reaction I've had on social media.
A very sustained campaign to abuse me, shame me, threaten me, silence me, all from, it seems, people who just object intensely to me criticizing Israeli government policy, when in fact, most people in the world right now are criticizing the current Israeli government strategy.
And the reason for that is that the original mission was supposedly to go after Hamas and get the hostages back.
Well, Hamas is still alive and well, and clearly the numbers have been depleted, but it hasn't reduced their ability to run things in Gaza, or the hostages would have been released, and they haven't been.
But secondly, if you look at the reality of what they're doing with their blockade, for example, only recently lifted in any capacity at all, the three months they waged a systematic starvation program against an impoverished people, largely women and children, in smashdown areas that have already been obliterated by airstrikes.
And that, as even former Israeli prime ministers have said, is war crimes, just open and shut war crimes.
So the idea that somehow, if I raise a critical eye at this, I then automatically, according to X and people on there, I'm a Jew hater.
I'm a, you know, I'm an anti-Zionist and all these things, right?
All these terrible things.
I've been committing blood libels.
It's all complete nonsense, isn't it?
Sure, I certainly pity the level of political discourse, not just in our country, but also across the world.
This is increasingly why young Americans are being dissuaded from joining the electoral process.
We have to stop with the straw man argument.
We have to stop with the ad hominem attacks.
The reality is, is very, very simple.
On October 7th, Hamas and Gazan civilians went into a sovereign country.
They raped Jewish women.
They kidnapped Jewish babies.
They mutilated communities.
If you truly want the war crimes that you just described, which I certainly disagree with, of that characterization, it's very simple.
Release the hostages, surrender.
The war ends tomorrow.
Israel has said that repeatedly.
I encourage Omar.
I encourage Anna.
I encourage Mahmoud Abbas.
If you truly care about the plight of the Palestinian civilians, we don't use it.
Yeah, but hang on.
Yeah, but hang on.
Hang on.
Just return the hostages and if only it was that simple.
But what is now clear from the rhetoric of people like the foreign minister Smodrich, who was on camera last week outlining what the new mission appears to be, which many suspected may have been the mission from the start, although I don't see hard evidence to prove that.
But he was crystal clear.
We're going to clear all the Palestinians out.
And then you see 22 new illegal settlements planned for the West Bank.
The mission creep has been extraordinary and is now out in the open and brazen.
We want to get rid of the Palestinians, says government senior minister.
I mean, it's crystal clear.
It's coming out of his own mouth.
The problem with that assertion is Basilis Motrich is doing the war cabinet.
Wait, hang on, hang on, hang on, hang on.
The problem is, Basalus Motrich is not part of the war cabinet.
Oh, come off it.
You can't believe this.
I've heard this.
I heard this from the ambassador.
I heard it from Natasha Hausdorff, who's the most sensitive lawyer in the history of lawyers and couldn't take a bit of challenging.
This idea that Smodrich is some unimportant, irrelevant person in the Israeli government is for the birds.
He's one of the loudest, strongest, most influential people there.
He's the only reason Netanyahu is actually prime minister.
And if he yanked his support for Netanyahu, bang, Netanyahu goes.
So please do not try and treat me like an idiot by saying that Smodrich is somehow irrelevant.
He's obviously not.
So if you want to disagree with the answer, you first have to hear the whole answer.
It's sort of be the equivalent of you going on national television saying, well, Marjorie Taylor Greene said XYZ, and therefore that's reflective of the federal government.
But Sales Motrich is someone who I proudly protested against.
He's not making decisions.
She's not in the cabinet.
What's the analogy?
I don't get it.
She's not.
No, it would be like Marco.
Sorry.
It would be like Marco Rubio doing it.
And then it would be highly significant.
There's no comparison between Marjorie Taylor Greene and Smodrich.
He's the foreign minister of Israel.
She's nothing.
Hang on.
First of all, Batalis Motris is not the foreign minister.
That's Gidon Sa'ar.
Second of all, Batalis Motris is not making decisions pertaining to the war.
What's his job title?
The finance minister.
I'm sorry.
He's the finance minister.
Let me correct that.
I've said that twice.
It's wrong.
He's the finance minister, the equivalent of the chancellor of the exchequer, which in my country is the second most important member of the cabinet, right?
So it would be the equivalent of that in the United States, right?
And the idea that that's Marjorie Taylor Greene is nonsense.
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Sure.
So the broader point is this.
Journalist Hostage Crisis 00:06:38
There are currently zero Jews living in Jenin, zero Jews living in Nablus, zero Jews living in Gaza.
If you truly believe that Gaza is trying to be repopulated by Jews, then why is it that every single last Jew was kicked out of Gaza in 2005, including dead Jewish bodies that were dug from the graves in order to be expelled from Gaza?
The reality is as follows.
The overwhelming majority of the Israeli people believe in a two-state solution.
Increasingly, though, the problem is not the Israeli people.
The problem is the Palestinian people who are increasingly, as all public data supports, they do not believe in a two-state solution.
They believe in Udenride land from the Palestinian country.
And that is the issue at hand.
Of course, innocent civilians are being killed in Gaza.
That unfortunately is a consequence of war, which is why it was a really bad strategic decision for Gaza, excuse me, for Hamas to invade Israel on October 7th, which is why if you truly want to end the conflict, it's not rocket science.
Just call on Hamas right now, release the hostages, and surrender.
Why is it that there was a Thai national who was not Jewish, who was not Israeli, who was released from captivity two days ago?
What was he doing as a hostage in the terror tunnels of Gaza for more than 600 days?
The reality is Hamas is a dictatorial tyrannical regime that obliterates any emancipation that the Palestinian people have to self-expression and the freedom of movement.
And I call on all peoples, whether it's on college campuses, whether it's in the media, those in Western civilization, if you truly care about the Palestinian people, then you do everything in your power to amplify the work of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, which just yesterday gave 1 million boxes of aid and is doing the exact same thing today and will do the exact same thing tomorrow.
I've given you a good shot to speak about that.
I have to get this out.
I have to get this out, okay?
You want to talk about how Greta Thunberg got involved in some sort of political theater, whatever.
I don't care what anyone thinks about Greta Thunberg.
I see that as a distraction.
What it's distracting from is the fact that IDF soldiers are intentionally shooting at and killing desperate Palestinians as they're trying to get humanitarian aid from this Israeli-backed organization, which of course is able to even exist because they defamed UNRWA.
They starved Palestinians for months.
Shut up.
They starved Palestinians for months.
And then, as the Palestinians are desperate for food, they lure them in with this Gaza Humanitarian Foundation and shoot at them.
Upward of 200 people since late May have been shot at and killed by Israeli soldiers.
Do not forget that.
That's the heart of this story.
Let's not forget about the 232 journalists in Gaza.
That's not true.
That have been slaughtered by the ID.
You disgusted it when people disgust me.
They confirmed the people like you.
I can't believe the IDF is the one who is assuring that there's humanitarian aid.
I'm an Armenian.
11 genetic meals that have been distributed.
You are a genocider.
Disgusting.
I know you don't like facts, Anna, but this is creating.
The only person who is threatening.
I can't.
The only group that is threatening the distribution of aid is Hamas.
That is who has been shooting at Hamas.
You know, Millennium Palestinians themselves.
Israeli forces.
Don't talk over each other.
Here's what I'm saying.
Emily, here's what I would say.
Here's what I would say.
We don't actually know for a fact.
Hamas shot at them.
Okay.
We don't actually know.
We don't actually know for a fact who has done all this shooting or how much of it was done by the IDF or how much by Hamas.
I'm sure Hamas wouldn't hesitate to shoot their own.
They've done it many times.
But we don't know.
And there's a reason we don't know, Emily, for a fact, is that the Israeli government continues to ban international journalists from going into Gaza.
And there's only one reason.
As Jeremy Bowen, the BBC's Middle East editor said in a very interesting and thoughtful, lengthy piece about all this.
There can only be one conclusion because at the start of this, the IDF took international journalists to the kibbutzis where this horror had unfurled and showed them everything.
But ever since then, they banned international journalists from going to see what's happening in Gaza.
And the only conclusion of these two positions, one, showing what happened to Israelis, but not allowing anyone to see what's happening to Palestinians, the only logical conclusion is that the IDF is doing things they don't want people to see.
So, Pierce, I'm actually really glad you brought that up.
Hang on, I actually agree with your position.
I think that the state of Israel should do much more to ensure that international journalists are able to freely enter Gaza.
I think that there are other concerns on the ground, like security concerns, because it has been that Hamas has taken international journalists hostage.
You know, as well as me, Alan Johnston is a great example of this in 2021, as well as 2014.
We saw that Hamas was pressuring international journalists on the ground, not allowing reports to be sent out unless they were approved by Hamas.
So there is an actual threat in addition to the USA.
But the risk assessment should be made by the journalists.
It's not for the IDF or the Israeli government to determine a risk assessment for independent international journalists.
They will decide that Israel should ensure and do everything they can.
I agree with you.
I think that Israel should do everything they can in order to ensure their security as much as humanly possible.
But there are a lot of factors at play here, including the use of human shields by Hamas, including the pressure on international journalists, including the threat of hostage taking.
And so there are a lot of factors that play into this decision.
Now, I'm with you on the end result.
I think that this is something that Israel really needs to do, and it's critically important because I believe that the information that they find in the materials that they are able to go through, in the materials that even the IDF has released about some of these people, some of the claims that they have made, are things that should be scrutinized by the international community on the ground.
All right.
Omar.
We have to be clear first about who is killing the people who are going to these distribution centers.
There is always a pattern that repeats itself over and over again of the Israeli government claiming they had nothing to do with an incident until there is an independent investigation.
In this case, in the most recent shooting, CNN did an analysis of the recordings and concluded that the gunfire was consistent with something that would come out of the Israeli military.
And that's why they pointed the finger at the Israeli military.
Legitimate Criticism of Israel 00:15:29
And this is a pattern that repeats itself over and over again.
You had the killing of 15 paramedics by the Israeli military that initially the Israeli military pretended they had nothing to do with until the facts were uncovered, until they dug up the ground and saw where the ambulance was buried, until they got the recordings of the incident.
And once they're caught red-handed, it's always like, oops, that must have been an accident.
But at what point are we going to stop listening to a government that has produced a record of lying over and over again?
I mean, they've pointed at a calendar on a wall in a hospital that simply has the days of the week on it written in Arabic.
And just assuming that this is for a Western audience that doesn't read Arabic, and so they point at it and say, these are the names of terrorists on this calendar.
I mean, we just have to get to the point to where we can't give this government the benefit of the doubt anymore.
They and everybody who does apologetics for them, like Emily does, are simply full of shit.
There's just no other way to put it.
I mean, we have to hold bare minimal level of standard for the information that comes.
And I'm sorry, at some point, when you produce a record of lying over and over and over and over and over again, we have to stop taking anything that you say seriously.
And we have to look at the fact and to look at a government that is carrying out genocidal atrocities in Gaza, as defined by virtually every expert on the genocide and every major human rights organization.
All of them at this point line up and say, these are genocidal policies.
We know who's responsible for atrocities being committed against the civilian population that is being deliberately destroyed in Gaza to pursue what Smotrit said, to empty Gaza out of Palestinians.
That is the plan.
And just for the record, Hamas had offered to give up governance of Gaza and release all the hostages, but that was not good enough for Israel because right now, Netanyahu is saying the goal is to pursue Trump's plan of emptying Gaza out.
Dropsight has done incredible reporting on the details of these negotiations back and forth.
And to see Hamas willing to give up governing Gaza and release all the hostages and Israel still find a reason to say no to that deal tells you what Israel's real intentions are.
And their intentions are about destroying Palestinian existence.
And they're doing it in the West Bank as well, except at a slower pace.
All right.
Shamos, here's my question for you.
It's a genuine question.
I expected blowback when I got more aggressive in my questioning of an Israeli ambassador and a pro-Israeli lawyer.
I expected it.
But the scale of it and the venom and viciousness of it and the deliberately disingenuous twisting of my criticism of an Israeli government policy right now as somehow equating, as many of them did, to Jew hating and so on and be anti-Semitic.
Appalling allegations for which there's no evidence I've ever, ever been anti-Semitic or ever hated Jewish people.
And there wouldn't be because I don't.
But this idea that that's the only default position to anyone who criticizes the government right now when vast swathes of the international community are criticizing Israel's government for what it's doing.
I don't understand that.
I mean, I remember when I was editing the Daily Mirror over here in 2003, I opposed the Iraq war.
It didn't mean that I hated English people.
So I don't understand why this has to be the default position.
And I had it all, by the way, from the pro-Palestinian side at the start of the war when they all thought I was in the tank for the Israelis.
I just thought Israel had a right to defend itself.
But I kept asking, what is proportionate?
I don't know, I kept saying, what is proportionate?
And then I reached the conclusion several weeks ago, having been increasingly critical all year, by the way, and people can go back and check if they can be bothered.
But I've been increasingly critical.
And then when this blockade started, I thought they're actually starving people now.
That is a war crime.
You can't starve people.
It's actually a war crime.
And to not call out what you see would be a dereliction as a journalist.
But I just don't understand why criticizing a government means you hate a people.
Can you explain that?
Sure.
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I would definitely agree with you.
Whether it's anti-Semitic or not, it's sort of misses the point.
It's just bad politics and it's bad policies.
I'm not in the interest or in the business of dictating whether Israeli policy or the Israeli government is orchestrating the war well or not.
What I will say is this, and Omar mentioned this earlier, if you truly believe that the innocent civilian population of Gaza are being forced to have this mass starvation efforts, if you truly believe that that is the case, well, okay, Gaza shares a border with Egypt.
Why don't you allow in the exact same way that has been fought in modern warfare of the last 100 years, anytime an innocent civilian population is facing war in their own home front, that you would safely evacuate them to a neighboring country?
I remember when Amnesty International, when the Human Rights Watch, when Kenneth Ross said, hang on, when they said that it is Bangladeshi.
Why doesn't Egypt help us?
Why doesn't Egypt help us?
Why don't you just listen to them?
They're dealing with overpopulation issues.
Great.
So as I was saying, I remember when the human rights campaign said that it was incumbent upon Bangladesh to welcome in Rohingya refugees.
I remember when Kenneth Ross said that it was Uzbekistan's responsibility and Pakistan's refugee to welcome in Afghani refugees, when it was Turkey's responsibility to welcome in Syrian refugees.
We want innocent civilians to be protected, which is why the Trump plan is a plan.
You should take them into Israel.
Why doesn't Israel accept them?
And why do you interrupt?
These are all very good questions.
We have seen for the last year and a half that the only way we can safely evacuate 1.5 million people who are innocent civilians, I agree with you, is by opening humanitarian corridors into Egypt.
But the problem is every time we suggest that, it's ethnic cleansing.
Okay, well, then inadvertently, when human civilians force literally one second, because Hamas builds terror infrastructure underneath hospitals and they build terror infrastructures underneath schools, then Israel is targeting innocent civilians deliberately and it's genocide.
Okay, if you truly believe that that's the case, let's safely evacuate them.
Oh, we can't because that's ethnic cleansing.
All right, shut up.
The most offensive part about this entire conversation is how people insult our intelligence as if we're morons and we don't see clearly what is happening on the ground right now.
We see it clearly.
The international community sees it clearly.
The only reason why our politicians here in the United States back Israel, regardless of what it does, whether we're dealing with Democrats or Republicans, is because they're all bought.
But the international community sees what's going on for what it is.
And it is a genocide.
There's an attempt at ethnic cleansing.
And I'm sorry, but Egypt's not interested in aiding and abetting the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from Gaza on behalf of the Israeli government.
Not interested.
No, actually, actually, Egypt is not interested in welcoming the Palestinian people, which is why they bombed Rafa 20 years ago, but the mainstream media never spoke about it because it really didn't ruin the narrative.
And the second point I want to say is if that argument, Anna, that you are using was used in the 1930s and 40s, that Jews should not be safely evacuated to the United States.
They need to decide in Germany.
They need to stay in Poland.
You're not going to silence my ass.
You're not going to silence my ass by invoking the Holocaust or calling me an anti-Semite.
I don't give a shit.
Okay, I see what's happening clearly.
I'm going to speak up about it and no one's going to shut me up.
Period.
And a story, we see what's going on.
The entire international community sees what's happening.
The Israeli government wants to genocide and ethnically cleanse Palestinians.
What I find, the West Bank, too.
What I find amazing.
Hang on, shut up, please.
Hang on.
I want to go to Emily.
What I find extraordinary, I genuinely mean this, is there seems to be either a lack of awareness of what the rest of the world is now beginning to feel about this, or a deliberate putting head in sand and saying, it's not happening, we don't want to hear it.
Because if I was an Israeli, if I was Jewish right now, it would be impossible not to be aware of how the world is beginning to feel about this and that this has got out of hand.
It's disproportionate.
Too many children are being killed.
There seems to be no end game for this whatsoever other than, as Chabos has just said, getting all the Palestinians out, right?
Which is clearly what Smodrich, the finance minister, was to do.
It's clearly what other members of that cabinet agree with him about.
I just don't get why there's no awareness or deliberately willful blindness towards the growing international opprobrium from people like me, right, who've been very supportive of Israel's right to defend themselves.
But there's just no apparent, all there is is a digging in and a sort of blind refusal to admit that anything the Israeli government is doing is wrong when most people, including two Israeli former prime ministers, have said it's not only wrong, but criminal.
Well, I think the fact that former prime ministers or former officials express their opinion about something doesn't necessarily mean that it is or it isn't, whether they agree or they don't agree Israel is a democratic country.
We have a lot of division and debate about this issue even now.
And I also think that there is a tremendous amount of awareness of the hostility that Israelis and the Jewish community are facing.
Some of that is legitimate criticism of the handling and the conduct of the Israeli government.
I myself have a lot of criticism of the current Israeli government, including, of course, Smotrich, but not limited to him.
And I think that across the world, you see a lot of criticism from the Jewish community as well.
Unfortunately, at the same time, we also see astronomical levels of skyrocketing anti-Semitism, of the conflation between criticism of Israel or even legitimate criticism of Israel and anti-Semitism or anti-Semitism in the name of anti-Zionism.
We see attacks against Jewish communities across the world in the name of this cause.
And that makes it very, very difficult, even internally.
I'm speaking to you as an Israeli, even internally, to deal with problems that Israel has on the ground when there is so much illegitimate criticism and so much unfair criticism that is used to target Israel and exclusively Israel, even while there are all manner of criticisms.
But isn't it possible for slaughtering kids?
Emily, I do hear you.
Hang on a second.
It's not easy to understand.
Hang on a second, Anna.
I do hear you, Emily, on that, right?
Some of the anti-Semitism and the attacks on Jewish people, it's utterly appalling.
All of that, all I wouldn't qualify, all of it is appalling.
But I think two things can be wrong at the same time.
These attacks on Jewish people are outrageous, shameful, should not be happening.
The rising tide of anti-Semitism is appalling and shouldn't be happening.
And Jewish people should not be afraid to go out of their front door, which many I know are.
I accept all of that.
And I'm completely with Jewish people in wanting that fear to not exist and for the attacks to stop.
But I can park, and I think everyone should be at a park, what is happening there with the separate issue of whether what the Netanyahu government is currently doing in Gaza is acceptable or not.
And I think that is very unacceptable, what they're doing.
That has nothing to do with my views of attacks on Jewish people or rising tide of anti-Semitism.
To me, they can be two different things.
They can both be wrong.
I agree with you that both can be wrong.
I'm simply answering your question as to whether or not there's awareness both within Israel and within the global Jewish community about this issue, about the fact that there is so much criticism and so much hostility when it comes to dealing with the state of Israel and how they're handling the conflict in Gaza.
Okay, fair enough.
Omar.
You know, when Israel was coddled before, that did not change anything about Israeli policy.
During the so-called peace process, all Israel ever did is build more and more and more illegal settlements throughout the West Bank and at the time, even Gaza.
So you almost want to feel bad for the people who are defending the Israeli position because their position is indefensible until you remember how monstrous the content of that defense is.
Because on the one hand, you hear all this nonsense about how Israel is only trying to target the terrorists and they're killing civilians by accident.
But 80%, more than 80% of the Israeli public in a recent poll came out in support of ethnically cleansing Gaza completely.
You can't turn on Israeli media without listening to genocidal language 24-7 about how it's time to get rid of Palestinians entirely.
And in one case, you have a former member of the Likud party in Israel who recently said that even babies in Gaza, every last one of them, is an enemy.
So in the face of an Israeli society and Israeli government that speaks like that, to now come along and say, no, we're trying to do our best and it's only about defeating the terrorists, I mean, again, you're just fighting a losing battle, and that's why the world is fed up with it, because they see Israel speaking for itself directly, and then you have that filter that Israel's apologists who are trained about how to speak about Israel in a way that is supposed to be more palatable in direct contrast to what Israeli policies actually are.
And that jig is up.
That game doesn't work anymore.
Okay.
When doctors, Western doctors go to visit Gaza and see that there is a record number of bullets to the heads of toddlers in Gaza and they see that there's no other conclusion except to say that toddlers are being targeted, you can't defend that as targeting terrorists anymore.
All right.
Shabbos, final words from you and then last word to Anna.
Sure, I would say two things.
Number one, if we want to play the game of what individuals are saying about the war in Gaza, Hassan Asrallah has repeated for years, it would be great for all the Jews to live in Israel because it would be so much more convenient to kill you in one location than having to hunt you down country to country.
Thank God the Israel Defense Forces killed him.
Yahwah Sinwa repeatedly said that there would be millions and millions of more October 7th and we would have to fight to the very last child.
Thank God the Israel Defenses Force, the Israel Defense Forces killed him.
I will say this.
If you truly care about the Palestinian population, if you truly care about innocent civilians, then all I would suggest is that we would do what we have done in every single war fought in modern warfare when there is a refugee population.
You would safely evacuate them into humanitarian corridors so you can take out the enemy combatants.
And when the war is over, you will bring them back into Gaza and you can rebuild Gaza, not into the dictatorial tyrannical regime it currently is, but rather the Singapore of the West, which was what, which is what it was meant to be when Israel pulled out every last Jew, living and dead, in 2005.
They wanted to build up Gaza so that could be an economic and cultural powerhouse.
But instead, the Palestinian people elected Hamas, and we all know what that brought about.
So if you care about the Palestinian people, then all I would suggest is do not have the Palestinian exception.
Rather, follow the foreign policy of the last 100 years and safely evacuate the innocent civilians.
You can take out the enemy.
When the enemy is finally killed, you can bring it back.
And if you don't like that option, I have another option.
Tell Hamas to surrender immediately and return the hostages.
But apparently, that's not conducive to Western civilization anymore.
That's a lovely reason.
No, no, no, final word to Anna.
Final words to Anna.
I just want to mention quickly that Emily is one of these Israelis who's going around doing propaganda tours on manufacturing consent for the United States to go to war with Iran on behalf of Israel.
We can't make the same mistake that we did in Iraq.
We should not go to war in Iran on behalf of Israel.
If Israel wants to go to war with Iran, they shouldn't themselves without our military support.
Iran War Deterrence 00:00:43
And that includes taxpayer dollars.
Go do it on your own.
Go ahead and enlist, baby girl.
Go do your thing, but leave America out of it.
Our men and women and our armed forces shouldn't die on behalf of your country, period.
Okay.
I'm going to leave it there.
Thank you all very much.
I appreciate it.
Thank you.
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